For blindness comes even upon the gods.

Surely at my behest I deem that Hephaestus will cease from kindling the fury of his flame, and that Aeolus, son of Hippotas, will check his swift rushing winds, all but the steady west wind, until they reach the havens of the Phaeacians; do thou devise a return without bane.

The rocks and the tyrannous waves are my fear, they alone, and them thou canst foil with thy sisters' aid.

And let them not fall in their helplessness into Charybdis lest she swallow them at one gulp, or approach the hideous lair of Scylla, Ausonian Scylla the deadly, whom night-wandering Hecate, who is called Crataeis, [1406] bare to Phoreys, lest swooping upon them with her horrible jaws she destroy the chiefest of the heroes.

But guide their ship in the course where there shall be still a hair's breadth escape from destruction." (ll.